Exo : Anti-bacterial DIshwash Bar

Brand : Exo
Company : Jyothi Laboratories Ltd
Brand Analysis Count :  # 496

Exo is a dishwash brand from Jyothi Labs. Exo is a challenger brand in the Rs 10,000 crore dishwash product category in India. The brand currently focuses on South India and is slowly spreading its wings nationally.

Exo was launched in 2000. The brand was launched as a part of the diversification of JLL whose bread and butter was from a single brand- Ujala. Exo entered a very tough market which was dominated by the market leader Vim.

In competitive strategies, theory talks about various strategies like Frontal Attack, Bye-pass attack etc. Exo chose to attack Vim directly and aggressively. When a competing brand chose to attack the market leader, it needs to have a credible differentiator inorderto compete and succeed. Vim have tremendous brand equity in the market and it is a tough task to fight such a leader.

Exo's marketing strategy is a notable example of successful frontal attack. The brand was able to find a credible and sustainable differentiator against Vim. Exo took the position of an Anti-bacterial dishwash bar to fight Vim. 

Exo was India's first Anti-bacterial dishwash bar.As usual, the poor Keedanu ( germs) was at the receiving end. Exo positioned itself as a dishwash bar that killed all the bacteria in the utensils. The positioning was very smart since Vim was positioned on the basis of cleanliness. 

Exo was innovative in creating an awareness about the possibility of germs in utensils. There was also another smart idea from the brand. In theory, we often say that the differentiator should be relevant, sustainable and not easily copied by competitors. Exo's positioning of anti-bacterial benefit can be easily copied by the competitor . In order to counter this, Exo used an ingredient "Cyclozan " to protect its differentiation. The ingredient brand " Cyclozan " ensured that the differentiation of Anti-bacterial benefit cannot be easily countered.

By launching Exo with anti-bacterial property, Exo created both point of parity and point of difference with Vim. The brand talked about cleanliness thus created parity with Vim and then used Cyclozan to establish point of difference thus creating a powerful position in the mind of the consumers.The results was visible . Exo became the second largest dishwash bar in South India. 

To fight the aggressive attack by Exo, Vim launched its own anti-bacterial variant using neem as the ingredient. 

Exo later went into a brand extension mode by launching Exo dishwash liquid and later Exo Scrub. With the acquisition of Henkel in India by JLL, the fate of Exo dishwash liquid appears bleak since  Henkel's Pril is the market leader in the dishwash liquid market. Exo will now be restricted to only dishwash bar category.

Exo is a brand which is promoted exhaustively by Jyothy labs. The brand has very high share of voice and ads keep on driving the USP of germ-killing property. Since the dishwash bar category is not a high involvement category, the brand had benefited greatly by this share of voice. 

With the acquisition of Pril brand from Henkel, Jyothi labs now have two formidable brands in the dishwash category. Vim now faces the most intensive threat to its leadership position. It will be interesting to watch how the fight will turnout to be.

Xpert : Fast Action

Brand : Xpert
Company : Rohit Sufactants  Private Ltd

Brand Analysis Count : # 494

Xpert is a dishwash bar brand from Rohit Surfactants Pvt ltd (RSPL) which is now on an promotional overdrive. The brand is from RSPL  which is famous for its Ghari detergent brand. Ghari literally made the large FMCG MNCs a run for their money. The Ghari brand is infact larger than the HUL's Surf and is the second largest selling detergent brand in the country ( source). 

Xpert was launched in 2006 by RSPL as a part of its diversification. The brand is now competing in the Rs 800 crore utensil cleaner market. The market is dominated by HUL's Vim with a share of around 60%. The market is characterized by one big player and several small players. The nearest rival is Exo diswash bar  and Pril with a share of around 8% each. As history has shown, fighting HUL's Vim for market leadership position is not an easy task but that is the risk that a challenger brand needs to take.

Xpert has chosen celebrity endorsement as a route to attract consumers towards the brand. For this Xpert chose Madhuri Dixit as the celebrity endorser. The brand is currently running a campaign in TV featuring the celebrity.

Watch the ad here : Xpert  

The brand is using its Aquashine formula as the USP and like any other brand , it is talking about quick and easy cleaning. 

The ad is very basic and rather than using  Madhuri Dixit for testimony, the brand chose to use her as Gangu Thai ( a housemaid character in the movie Ganesha) for the campaign. If one has missed the Ganesha movie, the ad plot will be half lost.  

Xpert is priced around Rs 10 for 200 g bar while Vim around Rs 12. Exo is priced at par with Xpert. The brand hopes that the price differential together with celebrity will tilt the consumer choice towards Xpert. This aggressive pricing + promotional strategy is going to affect the smaller brands rather than Vim in the short-term.

What is lacking in the current strategy of Xpert is the absence of a clear differentiator. While Aquashine formula is the USP, the brand fails to communicate what it means and how it is going to benefit . May be in future campaign, these will be explained. Without a powerful differentiator, Xpert may not be able to break into the market of Vim. Exo tried with its aggressive promotions and anti-bacterial properties with limited success. It is very difficult to create a differentiator in a market like dishwash bar and almost all options has been used up by the players.

It will be interesting to see how this high profile attack of Xpert will play out in the future. In the short-term we will see some action in this dull category . 

Brand Update : Vim

Vim has become better again. After launching the liquid variant to counter the attack of Pril, Vim has taken the battle to Exo.

Exo which is a brand of Jyothi Lab has been positioning itself as the dish wash bar with antibacterial properties. Exo has been promoting the USP of antibacterial bar using the ingredient Cyclozan. The differentiation was effective and the antibacterial attribute gave Exo sufficient consumer attention.
This year, Vim relaunched itself as Antibacterial Vim. The latest relaunch takes on the differentiation of Exo. In marketing theory , we talk about Competitor Points of parity . Competitor points of parity aims to neutralize the points of differentiation of competitors. The latest relaunch of Vim is a classic example of this concept.
Does Exo has a reason to worry?
I think there are two main reasons for Exo to worry. Firstly its USP is no longer unique. The same attribute is now shared with the competitor .
Secondly Vim has put Exo in a trap. The new Vim uses Neem + Lemon as the antibacterial agent while Exo uses Cyclozan which sounds like a chemical. So here again Vim scores over Exo.
Vim is a classic example of how brands sustain its marketshare through careful marketing strategies.
Related Brand
Vim

Vim : The Vim Challenge

Brand : Vim
Company: HLL
Agency: Lowe

Brand count : 193

Vim is the market leader in the Rs 400 crore branded dishwash category. This 100 year old brand has evolved with the changing Indian consumer and is a power brand of HLL stable. The Dishwash market in India is estimated to be in the range of Rs 600-1000 crore ( conflicting reports on the market size) while the branded dishwash market is roughly 40%.The dishwash market consists of three categories: Powder, Bar and Liquid. Bar is the largest category followed by Powder and then liquid. Bar category constitutes 60% of the total market.

Vim has created the dishwash bar category in 1993. Till that time urban households used dishwash powders. The bar offered many advantages to the homemaker over the powder which was messy and uneconomical.Since then Vim Bar ruled the dishwash market .Currently the brand has a market share of over 60%.

Vim was initially positioned on the lemon content in the bar. The brand using its ingredients positioned itself on its Stain Removing benefit. The positioning was consistent through these years. A terrific marketer HLL is, invested heavily in this brand and made sure that the brand stayed on the growth stage of its PLC. The brand changed its form,added new features and expanded the market to stay on the growth path. To reinforce the stain removing property , the brand repositioned in 2003 by introducing the Stain Cutter feature .The company was trying to extend the brand from "Dish wash" to Kitchen Care market.The brand also created much inroads into the market with its Vim Challenge campaign which directly compared the brand with competition.

By looking at the kind of promotions that the various players in this category , I often wondered what is the logic behind these high spends on promotion. The logic lies in the potential of this category. The percapita consumption of this category ( value terms) in India is hardly Rs 4 while in UK it is Rs 150. There is long way to go for this category...

Vim faces intense competition in this category not only from other brands but also from the traditional methods. In rural areas, Ash is used to clean utensils and the biggest hurdle in rural penetration of this category is to educate the rural folks to use Soap instead of ash.
In the branded segment, Vim faces competition from brands like Exo from Jyothi Lab , Pril, Sabeena and host of other local brands. Exo is the challenger brand forthe market leader Vim. Exo brand has effectively differentiated itself by using its anti-bacterial property and uses the ingredient Trichlozene to reinforce the germ fighting positioning.

The emerging category in dishwash market is the liquid dishwash. Pril from Henkel commands this market with a share of 72%. Although Vim has launched its own variant, it failed to create an impact and was withdrawn in 2003. 2006 saw a relaunch of Vim drop with Actor Madhavan endorsing the brand. Pril has countered the campaign using Shobana as the brand ambassador.Marketers beleive that over a period of time, consumers will shift to Liquid since it offers more economy and convenience. But there is a problem with this category: Liquid dishwash is targeted at urban upper middle class home makers and here the users are home maids rather than home makers. It will be difficult to teach house maids to use the liquid efficiently .
The powder segment is dominated by Sabeena brand from ECOF. Sabena is very strong in the southern market and has a market share of over 65%.

To stay on top of this highly competitive market, Vim has invested not only in promotion but also in product improvements. In 2005, the brand took on the most problematic aspect of this category i.e the dishwash bar getting soggy. The reason is that these bars are kept near the sink and is always in contact with water and with in days, the bar gets messy. Vim then launched one of the most customer centric innovation at that time : Poly coated Vim bar. The coating prevented the bar from becoming soggy and hence the brand became more economical. This innovation is a testimony to HLL's ability to understand Indian consumer and translate that to product improvements.

Although these innovations can be copied by the competition, Vim has constantly improved upon the marketing mixes and has stayed relevant and different in the consumer's mind.Vim is also a classic example that even a boring category like Dishwash can be made exciting through smart thinking.. cheers !

source: businessline, agencyfaqs,magindia financialexpress